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I turned 28 on Thursday, the denouement of what I considered to be the “year of Jenna,” as self-centered as that sounds. But that’s what I needed it to be, as I redefined my life.

As hard as it is to say it, I’m not where I wanted to be at 28. And as difficult as it has been to accept that, it’s brought me to have the best year of my life. Things were dicey at the outset, but right now, I have that feeling you have when you finish a delicious meal without overeating: completely satiated and content, having enough energy to dance in the living room without worrying about needing to throw up. I’ve found happiness in knowing that if I were at where I’d thought I’d be by now, I would’ve realized that it wasn’t what I wanted.

So, to better explain where I’ve been this year, here’s a list:

1: new apartment

17: pounds of love. Also known as Pierre, my cat, if you hadn’t figured that out yet.

3: cans of Fancy Feast I feed him every day

1: time that Pierre broke my screen and jumped out my second floor window

2: dresses I sewed without patterns

5: refashions of my old clothing (and only 1 failure that had to be thrown out!)

6: skirts, all by patterns I made myself or modified existing (again, 1 failure that I plan on making in to a shirt, that is, when I figure out how I’m going to go about that)

1: story I sent in to the New York Times to have published. They actually emailed me back, too, so I’m reasonably sure someone read it.

4: out of the 5 goals I set for myself at the beginning of the year that I actually accomplished. And, yes, one of them was the one I wrote about here.

Infinite: amount of love that I have felt from friends, family, and random people on the street who always seem to show up to give me the compliment I didn’t know I needed. I have never felt more loved than I have this year.

I have new goals for this next year. Some are already in motion (I’m going to Spain!), others aren’t fully formed. But I’m not going to let this upward momentum lose its speed.

My fridge is a work of art: everything on there has a specific and defined place. And this is what is at my eye level: